A.Journal

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Medium

'Maybe I do', she thinks to herself.

Medium

'I deserve a much worse fate', she thinks to herself.

Easy

Overly defensive. Usually a sign of insecurity.

Challenging

There's more to it than that. Having a break wasn't her choice.

Medium

It's been much harder than she's letting on. That magazine was her life.

Easy

Presumably because her whole life has been flipped around after her magazine was shuttered.

Medium

There's a bit more to it than that, but she's reluctant to admit it.

Easy

Few of the middle class residents of the Housing Campaign want to be seen openly making offerings or tending the shrine. Such things scream 'working class'.

Easy

Maybe it was her husband's idea.

Easy

He does not see the it in you.

Easy

It has to come from inside. It's personal first.

Challenging

Women trained to elicit joy, to be polite and obliging, to please. It genuinely does nothing for him.

Formidable

He includes himself like one coming to terms with the things done during a blackout, or a bout of amnesia.

Challenging

She's concerned, but she knows his limits.

Challenging

'Why twist the knife?', his gaze seems to say.

Legendary

As he puts it away, you see the look he gives his masterpiece, as though wondering why it is not good enough for you.

Formidable

There he is. He's back.

Legendary

It's hopeless. You brought this on yourself.

Legendary

If this was anyone else you'd feel patronised. But that's not Ram's style -- he's genuinely trying to help.

Legendary

Glad that the time he spent on the whistle wasn't wasted after all.

Challenging

Neither the friend you left behind years ago, nor the quivering wreck you found in his houseboat.

Challenging

A small promise, remade and unkept a thousand times over. 'Tomorrow', he'd tell himself, until the word meant nothing.

Easy

If you care about him, the best thing you can do is step out of his way and let him rejoin life. Regardless of what he wants.

Challenging

He's not taking a no.

Medium

His lopsided smile is the same, though perhaps cut with a streak of bitterness that might be new.

Medium

A small silence as you rearrange your understandings of each other.

Challenging

It was too much to hope that you were here without an agenda, but he had hoped.

Challenging

He doesn't know Dr. Gonzalo E.S. Gonza.

Challenging

Dr. Hugo did seem cagey, not the type to hand out drugs without going through a robust checklist.

Easy

When all is said and done, the weed plug is Ramses' last point of contact with the world of humans.

Medium

He needs to feel useful somehow. Especially as you're trying to help him out.

Trivial

You can't abandon your old asset -- a friend -- in this kind of state. At least, not without finding out what happened to him.

Medium

Unbelievable. He finds the sound comforting.

Easy

A mirror of your guilt. Whatever is happening here, it is the result of how you abandoned him years ago.

Medium

Or at least -- he was.

Medium

Morbidly transfixed, you as much a slave to what you are watching as the unblinking spectator.

Easy

Either a medical emergency, or a spiritual one.

Easy

You're still talking to a cat. Stop. People can hear you.

Easy

You are preparing to strike the cruelest blow.

Challenging

Not a fleck of irony.

Easy

You can see your reflection, flipped, in the unblemished metal.

Medium

You're in -- as a poet. Don't let them believe you're anything else.

Challenging

They have. Many people have.

Easy

A melodic voice that makes you think of flowers blooming in timelapse.

Medium

Your human situation.

Medium

They didn't really talk, but she gravitated toward his presence like an animal to an abandoned building.

Medium

You can feel the tension going out of her shoulders, her diaphragm slackening as she straightens in her chair.

Formidable

There is a correct answer, but neither of you know what it is.

Trivial

Medium

She's done this many times before. She'll say as little as possible. Treat it like a formality to get through the moment.